Looking through the form book for the Sentry Tournament of Champions, it's hard to escape a feeling of sadness that not only is Cameron Smith not here to defend his title, but that Dustin Johnson is no longer a PGA Tour player.

Johnson's victory here in 2018 was one of his finest, bettered perhaps only by his 11-shot romp in a FedEx Cup Playoffs event a couple of years later. Brandel Chamblee might've infamously gone overboard in declaring a specific shot the best of all time, but the way Johnson drove the ball all week, it was surely one of the best all-round exhibitions of that club.

I'll miss Johnson and his nonchalant magnificence this year, just as I'll miss watching Smith duck hook one into the trees and still make birdie. Perhaps even more so, I'll miss seeing players like Joaquin Niemann and Matthew Wolff find out how good they really can be by testing their games against the best players in the sport, who overwhelmingly remain on the PGA Tour.

Only one of those is absent from the field for what's now one of the 'elevated' events, a move which came about as a direct response to LIV Golf and is designed to ensure the big names gather more often. That's not something the Tournament of Champions has struggled with, and with Rory McIlroy extending his Christmas break, I doubt the field looks much different to how it would've before the, erm, elevation.

It does, however, look a little different to how it should. Pre-pandemic, this was the most exclusive event of the year, open only to those who had won during the preceding 12 months. The decision to expand the qualification criteria to include some non-winners arguably made sense at the end of a disjointed 2020, but to formalise it now is to cheapen the tournament and remove what made it unique.

Players used to talk about what qualifying for this means – and by qualifying, I mean winning. Get back to the Tournament of Champions and you know you've had a very good season, that sort of thing. To be here now still demands a successful campaign, but did they really need to invite along a handful of those who didn't actually win but did make it to East Lake? I don't think so.

Had the PGA Tour been stricter over the last two years, we might have had two different winners. First, Harris English won his first title for seven years in the event that was meant to be restricted to winners during the past 12 months, and then Smith won it, his qualifying victory having come in a pairs event. Spot the dotted line from that, to Kapalua, to Sawgrass, to St Andrews, and to the other side.

The formula required is directly tied to the weather, because while Kapalua's Plantation Course is quite a long par 73, it is a cakewalk if soft and unguarded by wind. That was the case last year, when Smith shot a record-breaking 34-under yet only won by a shot, and a reasonably calm forecast suggests another low number will be needed if not quite in Smith's league.

In 2020, when Justin Thomas won for a second time, scoring was difficult. Two of the three involved in a dramatic play-off putted poorly but got by on their wonderful long-games, whereas under easier conditions the best putter in the field has won both subsequent renewals. It seems highly likely that nobody here can afford to be left behind on the greens unless a zephyr turns into something more.

Otherwise, taking care of the fifth, ninth and 15th holes in particular is a must – these are three easy par-fives, with the 18th playing the longest of four – and strong drivers do generally fare best, though it should be said that Smith, not typically one of those, led the field in strokes-gained off the tee last year. Ultimately this is a collection of the world's best players taking part in a rust-shedding shootout, so we have to enter it with our eyes open.